Sunday, August 31, 2014

Many New York movies that strive for a sense of realism are forced to be caught up in the doldrums of real estate (see Frances Ha and Please Give). Ira Sachs' (Keep the Lights On) new film Love Is Strange, a tender-hearted but also deep film about longtime gay couple--painter Ben (John Lithgow) and music teacher George (Alfred Molina)--is about housing just as much as it is about relationships. In fact, Ben and George spend most of the movie apart, couch-surfing. The bumbling awkwardness of being a temporary guest is something Sachs and his gifted ensemble, including a sharply-tuned, subtle Marisa Tomei as a novelist, portray quite well. The movie smartly skims over or skips the big events, something that could turn off some viewers, in its sensitive, compassionate character sketching. Chopin is heavy and gorgeous on the soundtrack and the movie has the interpersonal irritants, dryness and slow pulse of Romer movies (see A Tale of Springtime) or a vintage Woody Allen drama (see Another Woman). Lithgow and Molina are always intriguing but not really my cup of tea actors, sometimes prone to overacting, but they are marvelously subdued here and perfectly cast (by incomparable Avy Kaufman), believable and well-drawn. I wondered if some of the stories of the surrounding characters were unfulfilled to enhance the on-your-own mentality we sometimes have towards the elderly (see the McCarey classic 30s weepie Make Way for Tomorrow, a film that this one owes a lot to) or if they had to be cut down for pacing issues (the movie, like Sachs' Keep the Lights On and Linklater's Boyhood, is somewhat shaggy). I ended up having a personal emotional reaction to the film as it slow-danced towards its magic hour denouement--the Nina Simone Julius Bar scene and the painterly shot of Waverly Diner neon (the wonderful cinematography is by Christos Voudouris, who also lensed the golden Before Midnight)--broke me down as it felt so wistful and it hit so close to home. ****

Monday, August 25, 2014

The MTV Video Music Awards twerked its way back into our lives last night, forcing those of us over thirteen to wonder if pop music is really this boring right now or if we’re just getting depressingly old. With the top award going to Miley Cyrus’ “Wrecking Ball” video, putting a trophy into the hands of a director widely accused of sexual misconduct against Miley-aged women, surely there must be room to acknowledge work more exciting than a pop star licking a sledgehammer.

That’s not to say that all videos on this year’s ballot are awful—after all, Sia’s formidable “Chandelier” video gifted us with proof of Lena Dunham’s interpretive dance skills. But there were many music videos by less popular artists from the past year that were far more inventive and engaging than a good portion of videos up for VMA awards. I can think of ten off the top of my head. So I did! Presented in no particular order, and not masquerading as an exhaustive list, below are music videos from this year that deserve your praise, if not only for being 100% twerk-free.

Hercules & Love Affair-- I Try to Talk to You

Finally, the video that everyone who loved Inception’s hallway fight scene has been waiting for. Following two Scruff poster boys caught in a frenetically choreographed love affair, the video perfectly captures the drama of John Grant’s pleading versus the song’s relentless beat. It also serves as a healthy reminder that there are better ways to sell sex than giving Drake a lap dance.

Years & Years--Real

Years & Years has been putting out consistently great work this year, including the excellent MGMT-clone video for their MGMT-clone song “Take Shelter.” Still, it doesn’t get much better than watching the band’s very creepy lead singer (yes, he IS that guy from that awful Greta Gerwig movie) judge dancers with his playing cards. I definitely would have given that second girl the ace of hearts, though.

Neon Trees--Sleeping with a Friend

The first of several videos on this list serving "Pee-wee’s Playhouse" realness (trend alert!), you really don’t even need your sound turned on to enjoy this hot mess of lip dresses and parachuting knives. Be warned, though, if you do turn your sound on, the song will be stuck in your head for about three weeks.

tUnE-yArDs--Water Fountain

If “Sleeping with a Friend” is giving you Pee-wee’s Playhouse, “Water Fountain” ups the insanity to a Pee-wee’s Big Adventure level. Watch as tUnE-yArDs’ Merrill Garbus muses on death before flying through a kindergarten version of Wolfenstein 3D. Watch as a furry smears ketchup on his smock. There’s even a talking couch. “One potato, ten straws, science in action.”

Rubblebucket--Carousel Ride

Remember The Fiery Furnaces? No? Well Rubblebucket does, and they have been copy/pasting the Furnaces style into some excellent new stuff, with “Carousel Ride” and its accompanying video easily taking the cake. In fact, vocalist Kalmia Traver literally spends the video jailbreaking a cake monster from a candy factory. It’s Pee-wee with a blue-collar twist, in the most watchable way possible. Kalmia’s hypnotic, spastic dancing will have you researching ways to put YouTube videos on repeat.

Lana Del Rey--Shades of Cool

Is this cheating? Lana wasn’t absent from the VMAs, with her dreamy video for “West Coast” up for “Best Cinematography” (she lost, hopefully embarrassing whoever added the weird flames at the end). However, her better-by-far video for “Shades of Cool” was sadly missing from this year’s ballot. Shouldn’t Lana’s ability to pull off Pussy Galore at the same time as Club Silencio earn her a moonman statue? What if she throws in a little Fast Times at Ridgemont High? Well, it was worth a shot.

Two Weeks--FKA twigs

Katy Perry may hold the inexplicable-Egyptian-imagery crown after her “Dark Horse” won this year’s Best Female Video title, but she could learn a few Best Female Pharaoh lessons from FKA twigs’ “Two Weeks.” The magnetic presence of FKA twigs (AKA Tahliah Debrett Barnett) captivates for over four minutes without a single camera cut. She doesn’t even stand up. Bow down.

All We Are--Feel Safe

No, they aren’t trying to sell you an iPod. The shadowy figures of the “Feel Safe” video, and their brightly colored backgrounds, have a much more insidious presence, getting more unnverving as the song continues. Eventually, we end up with Twilight-esque sparkling skin, glowing red eyes, and hands crawling over bodies in the dark. In other words, like a gay bar. And who doesn’t love a gay bar?

Perfume Genius--Queen

Speaking of gay bars, if you thought they were the only sensible place for drag queens and mesh tops, Perfume Genius’ Mike Hadreas wants to prove you wrong. Any Perfume Genius video is worth watching for the way Hadreas’ face becomes a pouting baby when he sings. This one is particularly satisfying because you can watch it in the middle of the work day, between thankless tasks and Excel sheets, and remind yourself how good it would feel to withhold giant shrimp from the board of directors.

Jamie xx--Sleep Sound

Sometimes a music video is so much more interesting than its song that it makes the song seem better. Other times, the video concept is so transcendental it hardly matters what song it’s connected to (I’m looking at you OK Go videos). The video for (the actually pretty good song) “Sleep Sound” falls into this latter category. As the song plays, several deaf individuals share one-on-one dances with, and in response to, the dancing of the video’s director Sofia Mattioli. Feeling out the song’s rhythm through her movement, the deaf dancers shed light on music’s power to extend beyond the auditory into tactile and visual experience. It’s intimate, heady, and frankly awesome.

Monday, August 11, 2014

Reading Shakespeare in school was a challenge for me, not only because I was fatally shy and we usually had to read it aloud as a class but also because I was asked to dig for meaning, plot or logic. I was always more interested in the texture of the writing and the details that were brought forth.

In writing my essay, I started thinking about the voyeurism of my favorite reality show "Big Brother" and the ideas and ethics of the eye and heart at "mortal war." I ended up being struck by how many elements were responding to one another and how the imagery also ended up relating to much of the language in the sonnet.